


The War At Home: Days 5-10

by serendipityxxi



Series: The Void [8]
Category: Haven (TV)
Genre: F/M, Hotel California - Freeform, M/M, Multi, Pizza, by using the troubles, curing the troubles, the fog wall
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-07
Updated: 2019-01-28
Packaged: 2019-10-05 22:54:31
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 17,742
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17333936
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/serendipityxxi/pseuds/serendipityxxi
Summary: Audrey, Duke and Nathan escape the Void and solve the Troubles. Mostly...





	1. Hope is the Thing With Feathers

**Author's Note:**

> As always so many many thank you's to Jadzibelle for the beta-ing, hand-holding, cheerleading, brainstorming and listening that goes into making the words happen. 
> 
> And so many thank you's to the readers who keep coming back time again and leaving comments, you guys make sharing exciting and so worth it! <3

They drop Dwight and Gloria back at the hospital so Dwight can get his truck and Gloria can collect Vickie. Then they go home and to bed.They stick Duke in the middle again, and probably make him feel smothered when Audrey curls around him on one side and Nathan the other, but he doesn’t complain.

Audrey sleeps for more than ten hours straight. When she wakes up the setting sun is edging through the curtains, setting the wall on fire with its orange rays. She’s alone in bed again. She can hear Nathan and Duke talking in the kitchen. She takes in a breath and stretches. It’s Friday again. Duke came back to town last Friday. It’s been a week.

She can’t believe it’s only been a week.

They killed Croatoan and stopped all his void creatures. She wonders when that’s going to sink in, when the relief is going to hit. Right now it doesn’t feel quite real. She still feels on edge.

Oh yeah- she’s not done yet.

There’s still the fog wall to deal with. There’s still a couple hundred Troubled people needing to be cured. But things could be worse, she reminds herself, closing her eyes against the thought. Things could be much, much worse.

Audrey debates pulling the covers over her head and trying for another round of sleep. Her muscles would certainly not complain; she feels bruised all over, tired not just in body but down to her very core. Her brain, unfortunately, has not gotten the memo and now that she’s awake, she’s awake.

She grumbles to her feet and shuffles into the kitchen. Duke sees her first and smiles at her bedhead or the creases in her cheek or maybe just at her. She smiles too, slides into his arms and buries her face in his chest. He smells good, like Nathan’s soap and coffee. Audrey’s head comes up sharply.

“Where did you get coffee?” she demands.

Duke laughs and Nathan steps up to hand her a still steaming cup. Audrey takes it in both hands and raises it to her nose, inhaling deeply, lets the scent jolt straight to her gut.

“Someone left it on the porch,” Nathan explains while Audrey is having her own little religious moment.

“Someone?” she asks, taking a sip. It’s been doctored exactly to her liking and isn’t the weak, instant stuff they’ve been drinking all week. It’s real and rich, bursting on her tastebuds sharp and bitter and strong.

“Several someones,” Duke nods to the counter. There’s a crate filled to overflowing of coffee and alcohol, food- even a box of chocolates sticking out. Audrey’s eyes go wide at the treasure trove.

“Found it all on the porch when we got up,” Nathan tells her. “Folk must’ve been leaving them throughout the day.”

Audrey’s eyebrows go up in surprise.

Nathan shrugs. “They’re grateful,” he explains.

Audrey doesn’t know what to say to that. Her chest goes tight and she has to blink hard for a few moments.

“McHugh’s out in his truck across the street, and I’m assuming that’s why no one’s actually rung the bell,” Duke adds.

“Did you guys take him any coffee?” Audrey asks.

The boys laugh, bumping shoulders as they do, and Audrey can’t miss how close they’re standing, can’t miss the way Nathan smiles each time Duke’s arm brushes his. _He can feel that_ , she thinks, pride and pleasure welling up in her chest as she watches them interact. They did indeed share the coffee with McHugh. Duke’s slicing up the vegetables to make soup. They got way too many and they’ll probably go bad before they get a chance to use them all.

“Thought we’d take it down to the station, feed Dwight and some of his guys,” Duke says casually. “They really came through for us last night.”

There’s respect in Duke’s voice; none of the uncomfortable truce remains. It makes Audrey smile.

She leans on the counter next to their workstation. He’s chopping carrots and Nathan’s dicing potatoes on opposite sides of the same cutting board and honestly she’d be worried about someone slicing off a finger if she weren’t so damn tickled by how close they’re standing. Close enough to feel the warmth off each other’s skin.

Audrey closes her eyes and takes another sip of her coffee, then she steels herself and fixes Nathan with a look.

“Alright,” she says, “update me.”

Nathan laughs, shakes his head. “Been on the phone to Dwight,” he admits. “Things’re stabilizing without the creatures.”

Audrey lets out the breath she hadn’t known she was holding.

“Folk’ve mostly stayed at home today, recovering, but there’ve been rumblings. Vince called. He wants to know when we’re going to start giving out the cure again.”

Audrey has a sip of coffee instead of giving in to the urge to tell Vince where to stick the cure. She can feel it travel all the way down her throat to settle warm in her stomach, where it makes her feel better about life.

“We should head to the station, check in at least,” she says finally.

Nathan and Duke glance at each other. Duke checks his watch and holds out his hand. Nathan takes out his wallet and slaps five dollars into it.

Audrey tilts her head. “Seriously?” she asks as the boys chuckle.

“Give me another hour to finish the soup and we can go,” Duke tells her, pocketing the money. Audrey scowls and steals a slice of carrot. Duke makes a show of slapping at her hand but pulls back to carefully catch her wrists instead, the smile falling off his face.

“Audrey,” he gasps quietly, staring at the purple finger-shaped bruises that ring her arm.

Nathan edges her in from the other side, staring too, and Audrey shrugs, wishing she had long sleeves to pull down over the marks. “The first time I tried to pull aether from him he grabbed me,” she explains as nonchalantly as she can, pushing down the rage that still simmers in her blood. “Doesn’t matter,” she tells herself as much as the boys. “It’s over. He’s dead and I’ll heal.” She says the words out loud and they feel good, though not good enough to wipe away the anger, the fear of those long minutes.

Duke lifts her hand to his lips and kisses each bruise softly, making Audrey’s heart pound. Nathan’s hand comes down on her shoulder when he’s done. Squeezes gently, even through the fabric of her t shirt, because Nathan can judge things like that now.

“’d kill him again for you, Parker,” Nathan swears into her ear and Audrey blinks back tears.

“So would I,” she tells Nathan, then slips away from them to go shower.

 -----

Duke is true to his word; within the hour they’re packing up the soup and heading out to the station. They’re greeted with cheers when they walk in the door, even before people know they’ve brought food. Police officers and members of the guard, civilians who are there to make complaints and people who are just scared and don’t have anywhere better to be, they’re all so glad to see them. Audrey suffers through claps on the back and tearful hugs to the best of her ability before she beats a retreat to her office with Dwight and the boys.

She doesn’t miss that there are five or six civilians just sitting around, looking hungrily at her. She knows what they want.

Dwight brings them up to speed. Approximately a hundred and sixty three people turned up to fight the Void creatures last night. They took thirty-seven losses. Audrey feels her heart stutter at the number. Thirty-seven people. Thirty-seven families grieving. She swallows the lump in her throat and tries hard to listen to what Dwight’s saying about property damage and all that. When they’re done she goes out to the bullpen and starts pulling in the Troubled who have been waiting for her to show up.

Nathan and Duke are ladling out soup from behind a folding table in the bullpen when she goes out to collect a second person because Jason Shurko can control his Trouble now. Soup’s going out in all manner of containers - tupperware and coffee mugs and styrofoam cups someone’s unearthed from the breakroom. The atmosphere in the room is totally different from when they came in, lighter- folk are talking and laughing, relaxed like she hasn’t seen in weeks.

“This is good soup, Duke,” a redheaded guy from the Guard - Kevin maybe? - toasts Duke with his mug, “but damn I wish it was pizza.” That gets a laugh from the whole room.

“I wish it was tequila!” Someone else shouts.

The room erupts into calls of what they wish it was but there’s hope under all the joking. They’ve had a miracle, the Void creatures have been stopped. If they can stop the Void creatures then surely the wall will come down, someday.

Audrey feels all that hope land squarely, heavily, on her shoulders.

Duke looks consideringly at Nathan then he leans over and whispers something to him. Nathan shivers at the sensation of Duke’s breath on his ear but his brow is furrowed in concentration.  Audrey changes her trajectory. She knows that look. Nathan shakes his head no, shutting Duke down, but Duke will not be swayed. He leans over and whispers again.

Nathan shoots him a look but Duke is already beckoning Kevin from the Guard over to take his place ladling out soup.

Kevin gives Duke a suspicious look and leans over to murmur quietly in his ear. Something flashes between their hands before the conversation is over. Audrey only sees it because she’s looking so carefully.

Duke grins at her, a real Duke grin, happy and mischievous, eyebrows up and eyes wide, already imploring her to go along with whatever he’s planning.

Audrey cannot fight the smile that crosses her face even if she knows she’d rather not do whatever he’s thinking of doing. It’s been too long since she had some real Duke enthusiasm.

\-----

They go see Dwight and get his order. Audrey calls Gloria but gets Vickie so she takes Vickie’s order, and something for Marissa and Katherine as well. They get stopped at least five times in the hall. The bribes get more extravagant. Duke discovers to his chagrin that you cannot in fact call outside of Haven from inside the fog wall, even if you dial 9 to get an outside line.

They make one stop on the way out of town. One of Duke’s hidey holes. Audrey laughs so hard when she manages a peek inside. “Holy crap, Duke, you really are a pirate!” She cackles at the wad of cash inside. She’s very careful not to wonder where it came from. She’s definitely better off not knowing.

Duke mock glares at her. “I’ll be movin' me treasure as soon as ye’re gone ye scallywag so don’ be gettin’ any ideas.”

Audrey leans up and kisses that scowl until it melts into a grin.

Nathan gets calls on his cell all the way to the border. The bribes are outlandish now. If they wanted waterfront property they’d have some.

“Dennis isn’t serious bout that,” Nathan explains when Duke protests he should’ve accepted. “He knows I don’t like him but he prob’ly thinks I’ll feel bad and get him a pizza anyway,”  

“And why don’t you like Dennis?” Audrey asks.

“He works at Mary’s art supply place. Doesn’t do a damn thing all shift and makes excuses to leave early so she’s stuck with the clean up at the end of the day,” Nathan grumbles indignantly.

Audrey and Duke laugh and Duke tells Nathan to call Mary, take her order.

There are over a dozen other cars parked at the barrier by the time they get there.

More bribes are offered.

Duke sends a couple of them back home for wheelbarrows. “Gonna need help getting the pizzas back across,” he explains.

The fog wall roils against the night sky, thick and grey and foreboding. Audrey puts her hands in her pockets, rocking back and forth on the balls of her feet as she contemplates it. Her nemesis for the last month. It took Duke from her. It’ll take her memories from her if she strays too far from Duke. The tension that had seeped out of her shoulders returns with a vengeance as she stands there. The fog boils and twists and curls around itself like a living creature, as terrible as anything they saw in the Void, so many different shades of gray- dark and light, ash and smoke, even a gray so pale that in the dim light it might as well be white, white like the walls of a barn…

Audrey slams into a wall of _‘No’_ so hard it might as well be physical.

“I’ll stay here,” she tells the boys as casually as she can, “tell anyone who comes it’ll be a while.”

“Are you sure?” Nathan asks, brow creasing in concern.

“Audrey--” Duke reaches out a hand.

Audrey takes a step back, forces a smile, shakes her head. She doesn’t want this to be a thing. She doesn’t want them to ask if she’s okay, or if she wants to talk about it. The answer is no on both counts and she’d rather not have her cowardice recognized. It’s ten steps through the damn fog wall. Duke wouldn’t let her go.

“Go,” she says, locking her knees, “I’ll be here.”

Whatever Nathan sees on her face makes him give her the out she was looking for. “We won’t be long,” he promises, glancing at Duke for confirmation.

“Just long enough to order the pizzas,” Duke agrees, waggling his cellphone at her from his free hand. He’s already got the other one tangled in the back of Nathan’s jacket.

The wind blows down the collar of her sweater, making her shiver. She nods, wrapping her arms around herself.

“Do you want me to stay with you?” Nathan asks, brows drawn down in concern.

 _Yes! I want you both to stay with me!_ She keeps the words back. Instead, Audrey shakes her head. “No, I’ll be fine.”

They frown but there’s a wad of cash burning a hole in Duke’s pocket and more than a dozen other people around so it’s not like she’s on her own.

“We will be right back,” Duke tells her again and Audrey nods, short and sharp.

Duke and Nathan get one, two, three steps away before something inside her snaps. She can’t. She can’t let them go through that wall. She can’t watch Duke walk through it again. She runs. They stop, turning back at her footsteps echoing across the blacktop. She grabs hold of Duke’s arm, to stop herself as well as to hold on. Her heart’s beating a wild rhythm all the way up in her throat instead of her chest.

“Well, let’s go,” she says briskly, before they can voice any of the concern she can see in their eyes.

Duke gives her a searching look. Whatever he sees passes muster because he inclines his head and they go into the fog. Three, four, five, six, seven steps and they’re out the other side. Audrey holds her breath the whole time. They step into a twilight so blue it takes her breath away. It’s like someone turned up the contrast in the world outside. The stars are out in force overhead, brilliant and sharp and cold. In the distance she can hear traffic noises. Audrey inhales and the air is sweet, crisp. Tears spark in her eyes and she has to blink them away because she doesn’t want them now, she doesn’t want anything blocking her view.

The outside world still exists.

There are people out here who have never heard of the Troubles. They get to go to their jobs and come home at the end of the day. They get to take days off. People who are so painfully normal they dream of being special.

The whole world is still here.

Duke’s arm comes up around her shoulders, gives her a squeeze, silently asking if she’s okay.

She nods, breathless again, but in a good way.

The hope that infected the station house bubbles in her blood now, fills her lungs and makes her chest tight.

The whole world is still here waiting. Even if they don’t find a way to bring down the fog wall immediately Duke can still come through it and get them supplies, get them help.

They’re no longer entirely cut off.

Audrey wraps her other arm around Duke’s torso, gives him a squeeze. She looks across to Nathan and he looks as dazed as she feels. He glances down at her and she smiles at him, wide and real and incredulous.

Duke sits them down in the middle of the road to make his phone call. Nathan and Duke sit hip to hip and shoulder to shoulder while Audrey leans her head against Duke’s other shoulder. She can’t stop staring up at the stars, only absently listening to his wheedling on the phone. She inhales and it’s the first easy breath she’s taken in weeks, maybe months.

Nathan’s hand rubs up and down her back in soothing strokes. She glances at him and he’s already looking at her, concern in his eyes. She shakes her head. She’s fine. This is...good. It’s really really good. She doesn’t have the words to tell him that though. She just smiles at him and lays her head back down on Duke’s shoulder.

The grass on the side of the road is as brittle and brown as it is in Haven but further back in the trees there are a few sparks of green.

Winter can’t last forever.

Audrey inhales deep and slow, and it feels like the elephant that’s been sitting on her chest has evaporated. She can hear the wind through the trees. Not even five minutes ago the wind was a cold sharp chill down her collar and now the cold is clean, grounding, makes her feel alive, makes her feel _real_.

Audrey closes her eyes and breathes as deeply as she can, lets this moment of peace wash over her.

All too soon Duke is hanging up the phone. She sits up when he does, reluctance in every bone in her body.

“How long’s the wait?” Nathan asks.

“Bout two hours they promised.”

Audrey feels a wild surge of hope. Two hours. She’d love to spend two hours out here.

“Should go back in, let em know,” Nathan nods to the wall behind them but he looks as disappointed as Audrey feels at his words.

“I will make you a deal,” Duke offers, “we go back and let whoever’s on the other side know but then we come back out here and wait by ourselves.”

“Deal,” Nathan agrees before Audrey can. He probably needs this more than she does, she realizes, that’s his town back there after all. Nathan claimed Haven, has been struggling to hold it together, longer than any of them.

“Deal,” Audrey echoes.

She still clings to Duke on the trip through the fog wall, clenches her fingers in the fabric of his coat so tight they probably leave marks. It would be so easy to get lost inside the fog. Duke is true to his word, they pop in and then head right back out. This time he doesn’t stop a few steps outside the barrier, this time he walks them down the road with a slow meandering gait through puddles of copper light as the streetlights switch on.

Audrey glances back after it’s clear they’re not stopping, nerves swamping her.

“I won’t let go, Audrey,” Duke promises with a squeeze of her hand. He’s got his other arm thrown around Nathan’s shoulder casually but in a way that puts them in almost full body contact.

Audrey squeezes his hand back. “I know,” she tells him, and she does. She believes him, he’s not letting them go. It’s a heady thought.

“Just want to get to the highway, told the kid we’d meet him at mile marker 71,” he explains and Audrey feels her cheeks heat, embarrassed she hadn’t heard that.

So they trudge out to the highway on a road she’s always driven before. It’s strange walking it at night, quiet, though there’s never much traffic. They’re lucky they didn’t come out near I-95, that’s a lot busier. There’s the tree with the split fork and a fence she never noticed and a noise that resolves itself into the sea, bashing against the rocks of the cliff once the highway comes into sight. Duke drags them across the road and over the guardrail to sit on the eight or so feet of space before the cliff drops into the sea.

Audrey has to resort to climbing the rail, her boys and their long legs make the task look annoyingly easy.

“Probably shouldn’t be here,” Nathan worries even as he steps over the rail.

“That boulder should keep anyone from spotting us,” Duke argues. “I just...I just want to look at the ocean,” he admits, and it sounds like it cost him - being that honest - but it earns him Nathan’s nod of approval.  Audrey can imagine how much Duke needs this, he doesn’t do well in cages and that’s what Haven is with the fog wall up. The thought makes her appreciate his dedication even more.

They pick their way around the boulder and yes, it looks like they should be well hidden from the road. They sit, all three in a row and look out at the blue-black waves that go right up to the horizon, nothing gets in the way. The air smells damp and salty. The ocean flings itself against the cliffs. The moon is rising now, sailing across the sky, leaving a silver trail in the rough capped water below.

Nathan and Duke talk quietly for a while but Audrey finds herself drifting. She can’t quite concentrate on what they’re saying, her eyes flicking over the rippling waves, the twinkling stars. She zones out until her butt goes numb and then she lays down, puts her head in Duke’s lap so she has an unobstructed view of the deep blue night sky.

The stars are out in force even with the glow of the moon. Clouds scud by limned in silver. She can’t see the ocean anymore but if she turns her head the horizon still keeps going and going. All the tension in Duke’s body is gone, he doesn’t fidget or squirm, he just sits quietly and occasionally cards his fingers through the ends of her hair, soothing and steady. He’s at peace here as much as she and Nathan are.

Audrey zones out. She’s not sure for how long but when she tunes back in Duke’s getting his phone out. She didn’t hear it ring but assumes it’s the pizza guy. It’s not the pizza guy. Duke turns on the radio function on his phone and suddenly there’s music in the dark. Nathan’s voice falls quiet as he listens with rapt attention. It’s been so long since they heard anything from the outside world.

They’re quiet for a long time after, each lost in their own thoughts. It’s Duke who breaks the silence. He clears his throat and opens his mouth to speak a time or two before he manages.

“When the shroud is down and the Troubles are cured we should take a trip,” he suggests, “see some of the world.”

Audrey freezes because she’d love to, she’d love nothing better than to not have to deal with all the things in Haven she’s responsible for but how can she just leave?

“You saved more than just Haven y’know,” Duke tells them, voice gone rumbly and soft with emotion, “you deserve to see some of the world you saved.”

Audrey blinks back tears at his words. Maybe they did. Maybe they do.

Nathan gives Duke a sideways glance. “We talking trip like Bangor or like Bangkok?”

Duke laughs, warm and open and relieved. “Where ever you want,” he promises grinning widely. “Where ever you want.”

Audrey misses the rest of the conversation, watching Duke instead, his eyes alight with enthusiasm - real enthusiasm - as he talks about destinations with Nathan. The invisible weight he’s been carrying is gone from his shoulders as he gestures to underline his point. Nathan is honest to goodness grinning at Duke, arguing just to be arguing with him, his face open and soft and animated the way he so rarely allows himself to be.

Audrey lays there with the warmth of Duke’s knee under her cheek and the waves crashing against the cliffs and the moon glittering over the shore and lets the familiarity of their banter wash over her, soothing something she hadn’t realized needed to be soothed. It’s comforting; it feels like home.

She has a home now.

She has a home she gets to keep.

No one’s going to take it from her. She stopped Croatoan. She has a place with her boys, at the station, in her town. She gets to stay and build memories and go on freakin’ vacation but at the end of it she’ll get to come back _home_ and stay there.

Suddenly the idea of going back through the fog wall doesn’t seem so daunting after all.

The song on the radio changes, familiar guitar notes pluck at Audrey’s attention. By the time the drums have kicked in her foot’s tapping. She keeps time through the whole first verse, savoring the sounds coming from the radio from a station dozens if not hundreds of miles away.

“Welcome to the Hotel California,” she sings absently, almost under her breath, “such a lovely place, such a lovely place,” her voice rises on the next line, the lyrics tumbling out as her memory solidifies, twelve year old Audrey Parker listening to the song at her middle school lunch table and memorizing the lyrics carefully because the nuns would hate this song. “Plenty of room at the Hotel California,” she sings and Duke and Nathan look down at her, indulgent smiles crossing their faces. She rolls her eyes but finishes the chorus, “Any time of year, you can find it here.”

“Her mind is Tiffany twisted,” Duke sings the next line softly, his voice still grumbling over certain notes, “she’s got the Mercedes Benz-”

Audrey grins, feels it stretch her cheeks in surprise, “She got a lot of pretty, pretty boys, that she calls friends,” she fakes a leer at her boys and they laugh. She and Duke finish almost the whole next verse when Nathan shocks them joining in on “and still those voices are calling from far away. Wake you up in the middle of the night, just to hear them say…” He’s got a good voice, no surprise there really, deep and husky and he only wobbles a little. Audrey can’t believe she’s never heard him sing before.

Audrey sits up for the next chorus and they sing, and it’s odd, and funny and she doesn’t remember some of the lines, and neither does Nathan, but Duke knows them all and they get louder and louder as the song goes on until the final few lines.

“Relax said the night man, we are programmed to receive.”

Audrey’s eyes go wide as she realizes what’s coming, Duke grins and Nathan buries his face in Duke’s shoulder as they all remember the last line.

“You can check out any time you like but you can’t never leave,” they end on a shout, and Audrey laughs so hard tears come to her eyes, she can hear the boys chuckling and for a moment - just one moment - things are as they should be, they’re together and safe and laughing.

There’s hope.


	2. Special Delivery

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I didn't realize Chapter 2 was quite as long as it turned out to be so I've split it over 2 chapters. Chapter 3 is where the smut's at ;)

The phone rings not long after, it’s the pizza guy. Audrey’s stomach gives a rumble in anticipation.

Pizza!

It’s been so long.

The delivery guy is young and suspicious and obviously a little scared about making this delivery out to the middle of nowhere. Audrey can understand that. The entire backseat of his station wagon is filled to the brim with pizza boxes. There’s even a stack in the back. Duke hands him the wad of cash and the poor kid’s eyebrows shoot through the roof. He’s probably never seen that much cash in his life, Audrey knows she hasn’t. She feels like they should’ve had a briefcase or something- though the delivery driver would’ve probably bolted if they had.

He helps them to offload the pizzas, wings, salads, breadsticks, and garlic knots, with quick, hurried movements. Before he leaves, he hands Duke a bag bedecked with the red bullseyes of Target and Duke tips him extremely well. He deserves it. There’s a lot of food steaming beside them.

Duke hands Audrey the Target bag. Her curious fingers yank it open and she laughs in surprise -- it’s clothes. She rifles through eagerly- t shirts and jeans, socks, underwear, pajamas, everything’s there, everything’s never been worn before. Her heart flutters into her throat, surprise and gratitude and affection welling up.

He listens. He always listens.

How could she have forgotten that?

She goes up on her toes to press a kiss to Duke’s cheek. “Thank you,” she breathes against his skin. Duke gives her a bashful squeeze in reply.

The poor delivery guy finishes checking the cash and starts his engine. “Have a good night,” he says on automatic and blows out of there with a speed she didn’t think his station wagon was capable of.

They grin. It’s already a good night.

Walking back into Haven with all the pizza she can carry is an experience.

There are a lot more people on the other side when they come back through. A lot more people than she’d imagined were going to be there, for sure. They’re parked all over the place, wandering in groups, talking and laughing. Someone’s put up strings of lights between a few of the taller trucks, bright sparks fighting back against the dark of the winter sky. There’s music playing from car stereos and voices, so many voices. Not tense voices, or angry voices, but people, talking, laughing, connecting. It’s been a long time since the people of Haven felt safe to go out at night. It’s probably not as safe as they think, but with the Void creatures gone Audrey can’t bring herself to want to scold them.

As soon as they’re spotted a cheer goes up, wild and raucous like they’re a band coming on stage, whoops and hoots and wolf whistles raining down on them.

“Shoulda done this last night when you took down Croatoan,” Nathan mutters.

“Hear, hear,” Duke grumbles immediately.

Audrey laughs startled and genuine, might even blush a bit if the heat on her cheeks is anything besides the warmth of the pizza boxes in her arms. She shakes her head. She wouldn’t want them to and her boys know that, but it feels good to know they think she deserves the cheers. They all do. They did slay the goddamn monster and save the village from destruction after all.

They head for the back gate of the Bronco- it can serve as their delivery station. Dwight’s already here with a couple other beefy guys from the Guard in case anyone’s thinking of doing something stupid in their enthusiasm for pizza.

It takes Audrey and Nathan and Duke three trips to bring all the pizzas back. Her heart hammers like it’s trying to bash its way out of her chest each time they go through the barrier, but it’s worth it. It’s worth it to see people clinking pizza slices like champagne glasses, it’s worth it to see the overwhelmed tears and hear the happy chatter. It’s worth it to sit in the Bronco and sink her teeth into all that gooey melted cheese and pepperoni.

Nathan makes an unholy sound that has Audrey and Duke turning to look at him in alarm.

“It’s still warm,” he explains through a mouthful of pizza, his eyes are all but rolled into the back of his head in pleasure. “Haven’t had warm pizza in…”

He doesn’t finish his sentence but they know. They know.

“Wait till you have grilled cheese again,” Audrey tells him gleefully.

Duke grins. “Tomorrow I’m going to make you home fries with the potatoes we’ve still got at home,” he promises.

“Home?” Nathan quirks an eyebrow and Audrey feels the bottom drop out of her stomach. “Thought you weren’t living with us?” Nathan continues, a smug little grin sitting on his face as for once Duke looks flustered by Nathan’s teasing. Duke’s mouth opens and closes but no words come out; still there’s a smile under the fluster, a warmth in his eyes as he searches for the right words.

“Thought you weren’t that cheap a date, Duke Crocker,” Audrey teases as relief sinks into her muscles, making them loose and a little wobbly.

“Well, what can I say, you two have made a very compelling argument and I’ve reconsidered my standards since then,” Duke finally answers and they all laugh. His eyes are brown, blessedly brown in the light of the Bronco’s overhead, and crinkled with affection. He reaches out and steals a piece of pepperoni from Nathan’s pizza while they’re all laughing, starting a squabble that is so familiar Audrey can repeat it in her sleep.

He could have run, if he’d wanted to- tonight or at any time. Instead, he’d gone in and out again, five times over, had taken them with him through the fog and back again. Instead, he invited them to go with him the next time he leaves Haven.

They can joke about this now. He’s not going anywhere.

They enjoy their impromptu pizza party.

 

Audrey’s favorite part of the party happens, surprisingly enough, after all of their phones go off at once. It is definitely not the phone call from Vince that is her favorite part. Duke gets off his phone first and starts closing the pizza boxes. He raises his brows at Audrey and she nods for him to close hers. Nathan’s still on the phone though, eyes staring out the window as he responds to whoever he’s talking to. Duke reaches out and taps Nathan’s wrist to get his attention, and Nathan’s entire body shudders in response, blue eyes going so very wide in the dim light. He sucks in a deep, sharp, shaky breath, blinking hard.

Duke’s grin is so broad it threatens to curl around his face, delight in his eyes and mischief on his lips like Audrey hasn’t seen in ages.

Nathan sees it too because he scowls and puts up his free hand in a “stop” gesture to ward Duke off. Duke though, is utterly undeterred- he grabs the stop hand with both his, and Nathan can only manage a half-hearted tug back. Duke traces his thumb across the inside of Nathan’s wrist, deliberately this time, slowly and with care and Nathan swallows, hard, phone forgotten next to his ear. Duke does it again, a long, drawn out swipe of the rough pad of his thumb across the soft, sensitive skin of Nathan’s wrist.

Nathan’s eyes are huge in his face, cheekbones going pink even in the dim light from the overhead. Audrey knows that face. Audrey’s been the cause of that face. She grins with wicked delight.

Duke smiles at him, just as slow, just as deliberate as his hands, his expression warm and amused and wanting. He reluctantly releases Nathan’s wrist and mouths “later” at him. A quiet grin spreads across Nathan’s face in response, expression going from deer in headlights to a soft little bashful smile. He ducks his head and nods once, looking up at Duke through his lashes. And he has no idea how attractive that is, but Audrey does, and so does Duke. Duke gives her a helpless little look and Audrey grins in sympathy.

With a put upon sigh, Duke closes Nathan’s pizza box and slips out of the Bronco. Audrey reassures Vince that Stan is on his way back to the station with Vince’s pizza, and the only reason she doesn’t yell at him that if he’d wanted, pizza he should’ve damn well come out to the border like everyone else, is because of how much she loves her boys in that moment. It is a lot. Audrey’s chest is not big enough to contain how much she loves her boys in that moment.

Nathan hangs up the phone before she does and Audrey takes the opportunity to waggle her eyebrows at him.

Nathan blushes even more and flees the Bronco before she can make any of the jokes he can probably see hovering on her lips.

Audrey hangs up and laughs and laughs and laughs.

The boys eventually come back to the truck.

The party goes on.

 

Someone has a serious set of speakers in their car, music weaving through the air mixing with the scent of cheese and the sound of chatter, and for a few brief minutes Haven feels almost normal.

Cally Tyrol shows up with her husband and kids in tow. The kids hug Duke around the knees, and the husband hugs Duke for so long it gets a little awkward. Gloria and Vickie turn up for a little while. Audrey sends Marissa an entire pizza through Vickie. Gloria glares at anyone who gets too close to them, making it much easier to enjoy the pizza party.

Still, there are people who have questions for Nathan and Duke,and people who want to ask, bribe or beg Audrey to add them to the top of the list for cures. One kid she cures then and there in the backseat of the truck; Gloria has syringes of their crystal juice in her purse. Audrey resolves to carry a kit of them herself. ‘Gator’ Pierson - junior herpetologist - got bullied by some kids out there and his skin started slowly turning into scales.

Audrey holds hands that are green almost to the elbow; they’re small, chubby hands and Gator is all of eight years old, his eyes huge and scared behind his glasses. Nathan was eight when his Trouble turned on the first time. She tries hard to think of what might have helped him.

Audrey tries a different tack than she has before. “It’s almost like a super power, but it turns on or off because of your feelings,” she tells the kid, and she sees the interest that sparks in his eyes pushing back the terror.

“Like how when Bruce Banner gets mad he turns into the Hulk?” he asks, sniffing back tears and a little snot.

Audrey laughs. She’d never thought of it like that. “Exactly,” she tells Gator, “now, can you tell me what was happening when this started?”

When the scales stop spreading up the kid’s arms his mom bursts into tears, crying on Audrey.

“Mom? Mom?” The kid rescues Audrey, squirming where he’s caught between them to tug on the woman’s jacket, his round little boy face serious. “I’m okay now, Mom, you don’t have to cry.”

Instead of stopping her tears the mother clutches up the boy, rocking him like a much younger child.

“Mom!” he protests now but Audrey can see his arms around his mom’s neck, the scales are already fading leaving clear, pink skin behind.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” his mother pulls away, wiping at her face. Audrey hands her one of the napkins that came with the pizza and wishes there were more room to back away in the backseat of the Bronco. It would probably look like she was running away if she opened the door and took off.

With her face mostly dry she cups the kid’s cheeks, runs her hand over his hair. “I love you, James Daniel,” she tells him and Audrey feels her own throat seize up. She pushes all thoughts of her own James out of her head. That’s a wound she’s not ready to lance.

Still, Audrey is so glad she got the chance to help this boy, so glad she didn’t make them wait til tomorrow because she wanted to enjoy the pizza party.

She uses the remaining four syringes Gloria has in the med kit and the only reason she doesn’t drive to the station for more is Nathan has the keys.

“Parker, no,” he says quietly, voice steady and firm, eyes crinkled in concern as he takes in the way her foot’s tapping, the angry brace of her arms folded across her chest. He can’t know it but her heart is racing a million miles an hour in her chest, the need to ‘do this! Help them!’ thundering through her veins with each beat.

She probably shouldn’t have opened by demanding the keys to the Bronco. She thinks about telling him Gator’s real name is James, but she can’t bring herself to put that hurt in his eyes.

“What’s wrong?” Duke asks, dropping a hand on Nathan’s shoulder, expression turning concerned once he sees Nathan’s.

All the fight goes out of Audrey when Duke shows up. She doesn’t want to argue with him.

“Parker thinks eleven o’clock at night’s a good time for curing Troubles,” Nathan explains tersely.

Audrey’s hackles go up at the tone.

“I-” she begins heatedly and then reins it in. They’re standing in the shadow of the Bronco, the open front door blocking them from most of the party, but she doesn’t want anyone hearing what they’re saying either. “There are a lot of people whose Troubles are actively hurting them,” she murmurs heatedly. “If I can do something about that don’t I owe it to them to do that sooner rather than later?” she’s shooting for reasonable, but thinks she probably lands closer to stubborn, which is frustrating.

“Audrey,” Duke steps closer, “there’s no actual cure. What you’re doing is convincing them there is,” he whispers.

“I know that,” she snaps. She knows that! She’s conning them into controlling their Troubles, and maybe that’s shitty, but is the other option any better?

“What I’m saying,” Duke’s show of patience makes her feel worse than all Nathan’s snarking had, “is that it’s not a good idea when you’re already tired and not at your best.”

He’s handling her. She knows that. He’s handling her like she's goddamned Troubled.

“I slept til _five_. I’ve been awake for barely six hours! I’m _fine_ ,” she grumbles, trying her best not to snap. It’s hard with the need to help ringing through her system like an alarm bell. She has to fix things. This is her responsibility.

“Yeah but _they’re_ not,” Nathan points out. “It’s late. People aren’t used to travelling in the dark anymore.”

“They might if I could bring down the damn fog wall,” she blurts out before she can think better of it.

Duke laughs and shoves his hand through his hair, turning away from them in...amazement? Amusement? He’s laughing. What the hell?

“Audrey Parker, you literally defeated the monster that’s been hunting the Troubled for five-hundred years, _yesterday_. You can take a day to rest. You can take a day to recover. You don’t owe the people of Haven your entire life.” He fixes Nathan with a look and adds, “Neither of you do.”

Nathan has the decency to blush and look away.

Audrey, Audrey is still revved up.

“Just because I fixed one problem--” she begins.

“Still gonna be problems tomorrow, Parker,” Nathan says, running his hands down her arms. Audrey hates that he’s being reasonable now. She liked it much better when he was arguing back. It was easier to stay mad.

“And the day after that, and the day after that,” Duke adds with a wry twist of his lips.

“I just--” words fail her, even as despair floods her chest.

They defeated Croatoan and that’s great, but they’re still in the same place they were before. Stuck in this bubble. Tonight just served to remind her how much people are suffering. Someone offered Nathan waterfront property for a pizza, damnit!

“You can’t fix the fog wall so you thought you’d try fixing Troubles because that’s something you _can_ do,” Duke sums it up pretty succinctly and she has no choice but to laugh because it’s that or cry. “But you’re going to start a riot if you just cure whoever shows up in front of you with a Trouble, Audrey,” he warns, not unkindly.

Audrey deflates at his words. He’s right. They can’t just cure whoever shows up. They need to work out of the station, make it official. There needs to be an order to it. The Troubles they identified before they killed Croatoan should still be their priority, those are dangerous Troubles to have wandering around unchecked.

“Let’s go home, Parker,” Nathan offers, not orders, nudging her into the truck like a dog running herd on sheep.

Audrey goes, lets herself be settled between her boys.

“We’ll figure it out, Parker,” Nathan says before he turns the key in the ignition. She glances over at him he gives her a small but genuine smile, reassurance and encouragement in the edges.

Audrey laughs, pulls it together a little more. “Nathan Wuornos telling me to look on the bright side, imagine that!” she says with a playful shove, struggling to reach for normal.

Duke chuckles and Nathan grins good-naturedly, taking the tease for what it’s meant as.

“Things are looking up for me,” Nathan tells them. “Felt that through my coat, y’know,” he points out, more than a little bit smug.

They laugh again. Audrey lets her head drop on Nathan’s shoulder, reaches out to tangle her fingers with Duke’s. She’s tired, she realizes. So tired she can barely keep her eyes open. So she doesn’t. She lets the noise of the engine and the presence of her boys lull her into sleep.

She wakes up just enough to stumble into the house and change. She’s asleep before her head hits the pillow with the boys still talking and the lights still on.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Got a fav line? Fav part? I'd love to hear about it.


	3. Processing

She’s not sure what wakes her next but when she opens her eyes the lights are dim, the t-shirt thrown back over the lamp. She’s not alone in bed, she can feel movement. Nathan and Duke are still awake. Audrey turns over to complain that she’s trying to sleep here and has her breath stolen by the sight that greets her eyes.

Nathan and Duke are naked, pressed together, long and lean and golden in the lamplight. They’re kissing, slow and tender, Nathan’s eyes closed. It gives Audrey such a rush to see that. Nathan’s eyes are closed because he can _feel_ this kiss. Duke’s thumb brushes against his jaw so lightly it makes Nathan shudder and Audrey’s breath come in sharply.

They turn to her, eyes soft, bodies languid in the syrupy gold light. Nathan’s hair is a ruffled mess, sticking up like a porcupine from Duke’s hands tunneling through it, his pupils blown so wide there’s only a thin ring of blue around them. He smiles at her, so clearly pleased with life in general in the moment that Audrey’s heart turns over in her chest. Duke’s grin is just as smug, his brown eyes hooded with desire. He gives Audrey a ‘watch this’ look and drags his thumb down the side of Nathan’s neck. Nathan’s entire body shivers at Duke’s touch, eyes fluttering closed. Duke and Audrey exchange grins of equal delight and mischief.

Nathan reaches a hand out for her and Audrey shakes her head.

“Can I- I’ll just- I’m going to enjoy the show,” she tells him after a few fits and starts. She wants to see them together like this- sure, wow that’s a good thought- but more than that she wants to give them this moment. Nathan hasn’t felt Duke’s touch in years. Though that hasn’t stopped Duke from touching him- or Nathan from touching Duke, for that matter. Duke’s fought so hard for Nathan’s attention, any way he could get it.They deserve to explore this first time together on their own.

Nathan looks like he wants to argue, wants to reach for her anyway, but Duke-- Duke looks grateful, though he’s trying to hide it, his eyes darting from her face to Nathan’s.

He catches her watching him and smiles, bright and wide and intended as a distraction. Audrey resists rolling her eyes at him. Barely.

“Well,” Duke begins, “you heard the lady,” he lands a loud smack to Nathan’s ass, making him jerk his hips into Duke, making them both hiss in pleasure. “Let’s give her a good show,” he orders.

Nathan rolls his eyes at Duke, kisses him to shut him up, hand on the bruise-free side of his jaw, cupping his face, thumb stroking under Duke’s ear and along his neck.

Audrey props her head on her hand, turning onto her side for a better view.

It’s already a good show.

Duke palms Nathan’s ass, fingers kneading the tight globes til Nathan grabs his hands and pins them up by Duke’s head with a growl.

“I always knew,” Duke begins solemnly, looking Nathan right in the eyes, “every time you-” he stretches his neck up and kisses Nathan for punctuation and Audrey’s heart turns over at the softness in the kiss. “Every time,” he continues when they pull away, looking deep into Nathan’s eyes again, “that you arrested me you were thinking about using the cuffs in a better way,” Duke finishes with a dirty waggle of his eyebrows.

Audrey cackles in delight as Nathan chokes and sits up, and she’s pleased to note his indignation does nothing to erase the blush spreading across his cheeks and down his neck.

"Shut. Up," is the best response Nathan can come up with, growling it out barely an inch from Duke’s lips, and Audrey can’t help but think of how many other times he’s done that. Nathan interrupts her thoughts by sliding down the bed in a transparent attempt at distracting Duke from how true that statement probably is. Audrey smirks and files that away for later.

Now, she gives her full attention to the way Nathan is kissing a path down Duke's body, eyes closed, lips parted. She can only catch glimpses of his expression but there's awe on his face, reverence that she knows he's not sure he wants them to see. He never wants people to know that he feels things; he feels _everything_ so strongly, their Nathan. He kisses Duke again, a lingering, tender kiss over the fading bruise on his ribs. _Your lips are the most sensitive skin on your body_ she remembers him telling her, dragging rose petals against his own.

"Tell us how he feels, Nathan," she asks, and she’s rewarded with a full body shudder from Nathan and a groan of pleasure from Duke, who promptly drops his head back against the pillows.

Nathan presses a few more kisses across Duke's stomach, trails a path around his belly button, hisses in a breath as he comes to Duke's hips. There, clear as day, are thumbprint bruises, one on each hip. Audrey can see the matching fingers spread across his side. They're from the other night. Before-- On the day--

"Why didn’t you tell me, was holding on too hard!" Nathan demands of Duke.

Duke lifts up his head and cracks an eye at them, looking half drunk with Nathan's touch and shrugs, ghosts his own thumb over one of the marks. "I didn't mind," he answers.

"I mind," Nathan growls.

Audrey can imagine why Duke doesn't mind. Can imagine how the bruises reminded him, every time they twinged, that Nathan had cared enough to cling to him so tightly he left those marks.

Audrey breaks her word and reaches out to press the bruise closest to her. Duke shudders in response from top to toe, reaches out a hand to card through her hair. Audrey presses a kiss to his wrist and lays back down.

"I think it's Duke's opinion that counts here, Nathan," she chides gently.

Duke reaches out a hand and grips Nathan's shoulder, shakes him a little in their shorthand for 'listen to me.'

"And Duke likes these marks," he tells Nathan, tone insufferable enough to make Nathan huff up at him instead of glaring at the sheets in self loathing. When Duke has his attention he meets Nathan's gaze, expression going serious.

"Everything you go through in life leaves some kind of mark, Nathan." He points to his tattoos, to the scabbed over cut on his forehead, the healing bruise from William's boot. He doesn't point to Mara's marks but they’re all thinking of them. "I like marks that remind me of the good things," he explains, pointing to the tattoos again. Audrey thinks he's done there but he isn't. He opens his mouth and closes it again.

"When Croatoan did the warp and you two were-- gone..."

Nathan makes a sound and Audrey puts her hand on his arm but Duke continues anyway.

"All I had left to prove any of it had happened were these bruises." Duke says the words lightly, like they don't mean anything.

Audrey isn't the least bit fooled.

Nathan isn't either. He draws in a shaky breath and then presses a kiss to Duke's wrist, still settled on his shoulder, presses a kiss to the print on Duke's right hip.

"He feels warm," Nathan says, letting his words puff out over the sensitive skin of Duke's hip bones, making him shiver as they realize what Nathan's doing. Nathan's voice is full of reverence as he continues. "Forgot how warm people are," he tells them, glancing up from under his eyelashes. His eyes are soft and a little sad. He presses another kiss, on the outside curve of Duke's hip, lets his teeth come out, nipping the skin, making Duke hiss. "Smooth," he adds, "like velvet." Nathan's tongue slides over the spot his teeth just worried. "Tastes salty, clean, like Duke," he continues though Audrey didn't ask.

Nathan drags his nose across the velvet smooth skin of Duke’s pelvis, nuzzles against the underside of his shaft making Duke stutter out a curse. He drags his lips up Duke’s erection, not quite a kiss, but like he’s savoring the feeling of him. Audrey’s breath catches in her throat watching them, Duke’s head already thrown back against the pillows, Nathan’s eyes shut as he concentrates on what he feels. His tongue slips out, licking at his lips, catching Duke’s cockhead in the process.

Duke bites out a swear.

Nathan grins, turns his head and rubs his cheek against Duke who groans again, long and loud and more than a little bit impatient. Nathan smiles, inhales deeply to puff it out against Duke’s sensitive flesh on purpose.

“He’s even warmer here,” Nathan rumbles, tongue slipping across the tip and then away, more of a tease than anything and Audrey can feel Duke’s disappointment. “Salty,” Nathan adds, “smooth, smoother than anywhere else, n’ hard,” he smiles when he adds that last word, smug pride plain on his face. It makes Audrey want to lean over and kiss him but she resists. She wants to see the rest of the show.

Nathan bobs his head over Duke’s tip, taking him into his mouth, making Duke sigh in satisfaction. _Finally_ , his body language says, shoulders sinking into the mattress. “God, Nate,” he groans.

Nathan glances up as if to make sure Duke is enjoying it, as if there’s any doubt.

Duke’s eyes open to slits and he threads his hand into Nathan’s hair, not to direct or to pull but simply to touch. Nathan leans into his hand and Audrey’s breath catches in her throat at how soft this moment between them is. Then Nathan sets to work with that same dogged determination he shows in everything else he does, blue eyes narrowed in concentration as he bobs up and down on Duke’s shaft, sucking and licking and making him writhe and moan and curse in what sounds like Chinese.

Audrey can hear her pulse thudding in her ears, feel it throbbing in her clit. Her nipples are so hard she can’t help reaching up to idly stroke one and then the other through the cotton of her shirt. God, they’re gorgeous together, all those long lean lines and careful hands. They love each other and she’s so grateful they’ve learned how to show that without hurting each other. They’re tender with each other here in ways she never would have dreamed they could be.

Duke fists his free hand in the sheet, biceps bulging, head thrown back, panting now, his tattoos standing out in stark contrast to the tanned muscles they cover. His abs are tense, tight as a bowstring, while his pecs heave with each breath like a boat on the ocean rides the waves. He’s beautiful, and he knows that. He uses his looks as a lever, as another tool in his arsenal. But here, tonight, he’s beautiful in ways he’ll never see: the artless charm of sweaty curls of dark hair stuck to his forehead, the vulnerable slick pink crescent of his panting lips, all the way down to his long toes where they curl and tense against the pleasure shooting through his system, body stretching, stretching, stretching for that final high.

Part of what makes him so beautiful is the way Nathan loves him, cherishes him. The way Nathan’s hands are so careful as they move over his skin, the way Nathan’s thumbs ghost over the marks he left, still so hesitant. The look in his eyes when Nathan takes a break from sucking him to press wet kisses along his inner thighs. Duke curses and whines, but doesn’t ask him to hurry up, doesn’t beg or direct, he simply writhes under Nathan’s touch, responsive and patient, letting him touch his full. Duke is spread out for him tonight, open for the taking, letting Nathan’s fingers and hands and lips relearn the texture of his skin, the silk of his hair, the heat of his cock...

Audrey shudders and presses her thighs together trying to ease some of the ache building there.

“Nate,” Duke gasps, trailing his fingers down from Nathan’s hair to his cheek. “Nate,” he says again, voice gone thready and raspy, and Audrey knows he’s close, on the edge.

Nathan does too.

Nathan doesn’t change his rhythm, doesn’t pull off. Instead he locks eyes with Duke, that intense blue gaze speaking volumes in that wordless way they have of communicating, charging the air between them until the tension is so hot, so thick, you could cut it with a knife, ratcheting tighter and tighter and tighter until Nathan breaks it with one last flick of his tongue.

Duke gives a wordless shout of surprise and pleasure, eyes going wide and then falling shut, chest heaving, cheeks gone pink, flushed with the power of his orgasm.

Nathan stays with him throughout, finishes by covering Duke’s softening cock with his big palm. He stays sprawled between Duke’s thighs, long legs hanging off the end of the bed, chin on Duke’s stomach, eyes on Duke’s face, watching him come down with the same intensity. He glances over after a minute to meet Audrey’s gaze. He smiles at her, so smug and proud it’s all she can do not to laugh. She grins back at him and nods, he’s done well, reduced their pirate to a shuddering mess. Audrey’s not surprised; Nathan’s a detective after all, he can read a person’s tells as well as Duke when he wants to. When he’s not wound up in some idiot vendetta.

Duke waves him up the bed and he goes, kisses Duke so softly, so tenderly it makes Audrey’s breath catch in her throat. She can imagine how hurt Nathan was, to be as angry as he’d been for so long if he can be this soft now. She can’t imagine how Duke could put aside his own hurts to get them here and yet he has.They’ve come so far, her boys.

Duke surprises them both, getting a hand around Nathan’s cock before he’s even finished panting.

Nathan gives a startled shout at the touch, bucking into Duke’s grip. He clenches his teeth, buries his face in Duke’s shoulder. He can’t keep still, his hips jerking and thrusting.

“You can feel that, can’t you Nathan?” Duke rasps into his ear. “Feel my fingers on you, feel how hot you are, how you’re throbbing in my hand here,” Duke traces his thumb around Nathan’s tip, it’s red and angry looking. He’s close already and Duke’s words only make him thrust harder, inarticulate, breathless noises escaping his lips. “Tell us how it feels, Nate,” Duke asks.

Audrey isn’t sure how Nathan’s going to take that. It’s asking a lot. It’s asking for him to be _vulnerable_.

Nathan surprises her when he grunts out the words “Can feel--” Nathan sucks in a huge breath. “Feel my heart like it’s-- it’s trying to beat out of my chest,” Nathan shudders and Audrey’s hand steals under her pajama pants. She gives her clit a rub trying to ease the tension as Nathan gasps and practically babbles.

“Feel my breath, feel it c-cold on the inhale, feel how full it makes my ch-chest-” Audrey could kiss Duke for how he’s grounding Nathan in his skin, giving him this experience, making him notice all the things he couldn’t feel before, the way his body works, the way his heart is thundering and his lungs are heaving and the way the arousal pools in the pit of his stomach.

Duke keeps moving his hand, a slow and steady pull, trying to pace him back. “That’s good, Nate,” Duke praises, “what else?”

Nathan whines and shakes his forehead against Duke’s shoulder, his panted breaths loud in the quiet room. Audrey can’t pull her hand out of her underwear. She’s so slick and swollen and it’s just too good. Too good to stop. She just has to keep swirling her finger around her clit, anything to ease the ache they’re building in her.

“Can you feel your legs, how tense they are,” Duke asks, rubbing one foot against Nathan’s calf. “Feel how tight your stomach muscles are? I can see them, see how you’ve got them sucked in so taut, Nate. Why’s that, Nate?” Duke asks, a hint of amusement coloring his voice.

Nathan nips his shoulder, making Duke yelp and Audrey laugh. “Know damn well, _why’s that_ ,” Nathan takes his face out of Duke’s shoulder to tell him.

Duke smirks at him from half an inch away and his face is so damn soft. Audrey has no idea how Nathan missed that Duke was so gone on him for so long. “Say it anyway,” Duke asks.

Nathan blushes, all the way to the tips of his ears and down his chest a ways. He drops his face back into Duke’s shoulder but Audrey hears him when he mutters “‘m close.” His voice rasps on the words and a shudder wracks his body. “So close,” he says it again, stronger now, hips thrusting faster into Duke’s grip.

“Yeah?” Duke gasps, sounding pretty breathless himself. “What’s it feel like, Nathan?”

“Feels like you’re touching me everywhere,” Nathan moans, twisting his forehead against Duke’s shoulder. “Feels like-- like there’s electricity... running through my whole nervous system again,” he stutters out. “Like all the lights are lit up.”

“Are you close?” Duke asks him again, hand moving faster and faster now.

“Y-yeah,” Nathan agrees, sounding wrecked.

“Keep telling me about it,” Duke instructs, then squirms out from under him and before Nathan can finish protesting he’s swallowed Nathan’s cock, deep throating him in almost one go. Nathan lets out a shout and then throws his head back against the pillows, eyes squeezed tightly shut as if he can’t see and feel Duke’s ministrations at the same time without exploding. Audrey doesn’t blame him at all.

“Duke...” Nathan groans, absolutely lost now. He’s still talking though, rasping incoherently “so hot,” and “soft” and “slick” without anything to join them.

Duke bobs on his cock in a smooth up and down rhythm.

“Close, so close,” Nathan babbles, neck muscles straining, jaw clenched.

Duke’s eyes go wide when he spots the lump of her hand moving under the covers and he winks at her, lips still moving over Nathan’s dick. Audrey grins and blushes but doesn’t take her hand away, instead she makes her movements bigger, more exaggerated so they move the blankets. Duke’s eyes darken and he redoubles his efforts.

“Close, close, close,” Nathan chants, drawing their attention to him. “So close!” he barks out on a shout and then he’s coming, his whole body stiffening, muscles standing out in stark relief and Duke is smiling like he’s the cat that ate the canary through it all.

Duke slides back up the bed, lets Nathan flop over onto him while aftershocks still have his body shuddering. Duke’s eyes are all for Audrey though, even as he soothes Nathan, running his hand up and down his back lightly.

“Now how fair is that, Audrey Parker?” he teases, voice so rough it sounds like he’s been gargling rocks. It sends a shudder along Audrey’s spine. “I showed you mine…” he chides, eyes soft and warm and a little bit amused. It’s his _‘I can keep your secrets safe,_ ’ face. Audrey can’t deny it’s charm is effective.

So she laughs and nods. It’s true enough.

She tosses back the covers then, shucks pajama pants and underwear in one go. She could put on a show but she’s just too damn impatient. She squirms around til they can see, til she can feel the weight of Duke’s gaze on her like a physical touch. She raises one knee, dragging her still sticky fingers down her bare thigh.

Nathan makes a sound and she glances over to find him watching her with interest, blue eyes heavy lidded and hazy.

Audrey smiles at him. “It’s only fair I show you mine,” she agrees. Audrey squashes down the thrill of nerves that shoots through her, concentrates on the feel of her fingers sliding over her outer lips instead of the rush of shyness coursing through her veins. They’ve seen her naked before but this...this is something intimate, showing them how she touches herself. One day she might tell them about the times she did this and thought of both of them. For now, she squares her shoulders and dips a finger into her entrance. God, she’s slippery, wet, and it feels so good to be filled. Two fingers go in on the next stroke and she curls them up finding her g spot and hitting it with each thrust.

Feels almost as good to be watched, she finds out.

Duke’s eyes are dark with arousal as they flit between her hands and her face. Nathan’s mouth is hanging open just a little, he looks… hungry. Audrey shivers and pulls her fingers out. She knows they must be shining in the light because they’re slick as they slide over her clit. The change in angle makes the pleasure so much sharper. She swirls her finger around and around and around, and it’s so good and so much. She keens a little, rocking her hips because that makes it better.

Her free hand comes up to tug at her nipple through her shirt. The soft cotton rasps so good against her when she pinches the bud. Her hand between her legs stutters at how good that feels, so good, like she’s touching her clit and fucking herself and everything all at once. The thin silver thread of arousal spins tighter with each twist.

“God, Parker,” Nathan growls.

“You’re gorgeous,” Duke says, voice reverent. Audrey knows it’s ridiculous but she blushes anyway. Duke reaches out and rubs his thumb over the inside of her knee on the leg splayed toward them. She holds her breath but he doesn’t move his hand further. He’s not going to help. He wants her to finish.

Audrey brings her fingers back to her clit, it’s swollen and throbbing and fuck, but she’s been on edge for a long time. She squeezes her eyes shut and gets to work, finger swirling, swirling, swirling around and around and around her clit. She doesn’t stop or change directions but she does go faster now, reaching for the orgasm she can feel building in her stomach and her tensed thighs and even down in her toes.

“You’re close aren’t you,” Duke asks, voice gone deep and quiet, the same tone he’d used with Nathan just now.

It works just as well on her, she finds, as she nods a breathless, “yeah.”

“Come for us, Parker,” Nathan rumbles.

“Let us see you come, Audrey,” Duke encourages, thumb still stroking against her knee. Audrey gasps, her hips stuttering. She cracks open her eyes to see they’re both looking at her like the whole room could be on fire and they wouldn’t look away. There’s… reverence on their faces and Audrey has to close her eyes, she doesn’t know how to handle that. Her hand doesn’t stop though, circling and circling, the pleasure mounting, that silver thread going taut.

“You’re beautiful and so close, it’s almost painful isn’t it,” Duke’s voice is so full of sympathy.

Audrey nods, letting his words carry her away as much as her own hand.

“Let go, Audrey,” Duke implores.

“Let go, Audrey,” Nathan repeats.

And Audrey comes, pleasure sparking in her clit, snapping that thread, igniting the nerves all over her body even as her muscles spasm with her release.

The boys are there as she comes down, wrapping her in their arms, tugging the covers up over them all so she doesn’t get cold. They kiss and stroke and it’s good, it’s warm and safe and… loved. Audrey Parker feels loved. She bites down hard on the inside of her cheek and lets someone stroke her hair even as Duke and Nathan kiss over her head. After a while Nathan gets up and comes back with washcloths and cleans them all up. When she falls asleep this time, wrapped in her boys, she stays asleep til morning.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Got a fav line? fav part? I'd love to hear about it :)


	4. Limbo: Days 6-9

Audrey wakes earlier than the other two the next morning. Duke rouses as she gets out of bed but she drops a kiss on his temple and murmurs “go back to sleep,” before he stirs too much. He grunts and does just that, face half buried in the pillows. It’s good to see him sleeping. Good to see them both resting. Nathan is a motionless lump under the covers, only the top of his hair visible. They tired him out last night. It makes Audrey smile to think it.

She showers and puts on the new clothes Duke had the delivery guy pick up for her. Jeans, underwear, it all fits, just her size. It gives her a thrill of contentment that Duke knows her sizes. Such an intimate bit of knowledge. The sweater is a bright, bold blue that makes her think of the Haven t-shirt Detective Crocker bought her in the universe without Troubles. That too is gone with the Gull. She pulls herself out of the fit of melancholy; she likes the new sweater. She likes the new socks that no one has ever worn but herself. Padding into the kitchen in them, Audrey feels like no one else but herself. It’s a good feeling.

She puts the coffee on and sits at the table listing the Troubled and their Troubles, prioritizing who to see, who to ask Duke or Nathan or Dwight to talk to. The coffee maker switches off on its own but Audrey doesn’t even notice.

She spends the next three days in much the same state, curing Troubles and ignoring everything else. She falls into bed at night bone tired and emotionally exhausted. But it’s the only thing she can do. She can’t manufacture more resources. She can’t bring the shroud down.

So Audrey spends all day listening to the Troubled, building switches, praying that this one isn’t the one that fails and brings the whole plan down around her ears. It helps though, having something proactive to do. It helps being able to help the Troubled. They’re still under siege but it also feels like Haven itself is slowly starting to regain its footing. Each cure makes the town feel lighter. Each cure makes Audrey feel stronger. Which makes it even more frustrating that they’re still stuck in here. She should be able to solve this.  

They had TJ try to read the fog wall away around lunch time the second day to no avail. Nathan’s theory is that the shroud is too big for TJ’s radius of effect. It covers the whole town after all and TJ’s radius when the darkness plague hit had only been a couple of miles. It’s as good a reason as any, though now Audrey’s worried that there might be more monsters from the Void still out there. Duke thinks he didn’t believe it enough for it to work. Audrey can’t argue that. The shroud isn’t some magical monster he can imagine vanquishing. No, the shroud is overwhelming, with its impenetrable swirling grey clouds that feel like they can suck all the hope out of a person. They can’t, Audrey knows she’s projecting, but it feels like that.

Still, people aren’t as beaten down anymore, there’s a light at the end of the tunnel. Which means they’re crankier and louder about everything. There’s a rumor going around that when all the Troubles are cured the shroud will come down. It’s based off of Croatoan’s lie but people will believe what they want. That means every morning there’s a crowd of hopefuls at the station that Audrey has to maneuver past, guilt and frustration prickling hard against her skin under their angry gazes.

They’re not the only ones getting antsy and impatient. Every day Vince or Dwight or some other person with an idea and an attitude makes complaints about who she’s chosen to cure, or about the rules they’re starting to put down now that the Troubles are known town-wide. She and Nathan and Dwight have a capital D discussion  sometime in day two about policing the Troubled once the shroud is down. They have to believe it’ll come down, and ‘fake it til you make it’ is practically Audrey’s motto at this point. So they act like the shroud coming down is a fact. It’s going to happen.

When it does, they’re going to have to deal with those who haven’t been cured, and those who have, and those who don’t want to be cured, the bigots who won’t have a reason to make nice anymore, the folk who can’t keep secrets and folk who will want to sell their secrets to the highest bidder. It’s a mercenary conversation, one Audrey walks away from with her stomach in knots. The practicalities of keeping their secret, of keeping power like the Troubled wield in line… the decisions they made, well, it’s the closest she’s felt to Mara in months. They’re for the good of the town, not selfish reasons, she reminds herself. Nathan’s hand in hers and Dwight’s somber face make her feel a little better. She hasn’t made those decisions alone.

Duke works just as hard as she does at curing people, putting that silver tongue and quick mind- and oh yeah, actual social skills, the sort that she and Nathan don’t have - to good use. He’s good at it, too. Audrey knows from her own experience, people like talking to him. He’s a good listener and he doesn’t judge. He’s charming. He can read a person - he knows when to be funny or serious and man, those eyes when they go soft on you in understanding...

Audrey is not surprised he’s good at this, not in the least.

When he falls into bed with them at night there’s a quiet pride in his eyes and a new looseness to his limbs, some of that awful tension is gone. He’s helping to heal what he feels he broke. He’s curing without using the Crocker Trouble. He’s making a difference. Audrey is so damn proud and she can’t say that to him, he wouldn’t accept it. He doesn’t even bring up what he does all day- it’s only when Audrey complains about her own cases, like how hard it was getting the Driscoll boys (and wow does no one need their Trouble to flare up again) to stop joking around and actually think about their damn Trouble, that he even mentions his own tough cures.

Nathan and Dwight spend more time dealing with angry townsfolk than curing Troubles. Audrey definitely would not trade duties with them. There’s talk of bringing in people with backgrounds in psychology to disseminate more of the cure, but volunteers are spread thin with resources as limited as they are.

The belief is building; with every cure they turn out, the population’s more ready to accept the next one and the next. The more faith they build the easier it is to cure folk. The more folk cured the more likely their whole house of cards will topple. In the meantime though, the momentum is building and the town’s faith in her to work miracles is mounting along with their impatience.

 

Audrey is the last to finish at the end of the third day. Duke comes into the room just as the now Trouble-free Darryl Jones (earthquake Trouble) is leaving the room. She gives Duke a tired smile when she spots him. He walks over to plant himself on the edge of her desk, getting between her and the list of names and her pad full of case notes. He’s here to tell her to turn it in, she knows. She’s not ready yet though.

When he leans forward his hair falls over his eyes as he smiles down at her. “Time to take a break,” he says gently.

Audrey is alarmed to find tears stinging her eyes. This is her Duke. The image she holds in her head, the energy, the vibe, whatever you want to call it, this is her Duke. The stressed out, anxious, angry man he was when he left town is gone. This Duke is sure of himself, content with a day’s good work, soft and playful and looking at her… the way he always did, she just never could let herself really see it.

Audrey swallows painfully around the lump in her throat and opens her mouth to say something, but Duke’s seen something in her face and he’s already shaking his head.

“Nope.” He snatches the paper with the list of the Troubled on it. “All work and no play make Audrey a-”

“Responsible adult,” she parries with a mock squint of her eyes. Her words are light and easy,she knows he can tell she doesn’t mean it because his face creases in a smile and he pulls the paper away from her grab.

“Now who would ever want to be that?” He fakes a shudder and Audrey laughs, snatching at the paper. Duke holds it higher over her head and Audrey scrambles out of her chair.

“Duke,” she warns, but he rises with her, waving the paper around now.

“Audrey?” he mocks in the same tone, laughing and backing up as she grabs for the paper.

They travel the length of the office playing keep away. Audrey grabs onto his belt loop and Duke lets himself be tugged into her orbit with a smirk and a fake leer as they slam into each other. God, he’s solid and warm and so real under her hands. It’s all Audrey can do to keep snatching for the paper.

“Why Detective Parker, are you offering to make it worth my while?” he teases, still waving the paper over his head.

“Could arrest you for withholding evidence,” Nathan drawls from the door, making them both jump.

He’s leaned against the jamb, eyes soft and face fond as he watches the two of them and Audrey feels something inside of her melt. It’s good to have them. It’s so good to have both of them.

“Are you just going to stand there?” Audrey scolds, despite the warmth in her chest. “Can’t you see I need backup?”

“From this nefarious creature? We could…” and here Nathan’s cool fails him as he stutters, “could use the- the- the cuffs on him.” The tips of his ears are pink and Audrey could not love her boys more than in this instant.

Duke glances down at Audrey as if to say ‘did you hear that?’ “Please, Detective Wuornos,” he teases with a wink, “tell me more about these cuffs.”

Nathan is squirming by now and Audrey takes advantage of the distraction to snatch the paper from Duke’s hand.

Duke lets out a shout of dismay and grabs for the paper but Audrey dances out of his way, darting behind Nathan. She knows he can feel her hands on his waist as she holds onto him, keeping him in between her and Duke. She knows he can feel her wrist even though he closes his hands over her sweater and not her skin.

“Hate to break up the party,” he tells her regretfully, pressing a hand against Duke’s chest to still him.

“What now?” Duke asks, and the tension in his shoulders is back again just like that.

“Think we may have had a breakthrough,” Nathan tells them, and his mouth is serious but his eyes are twinkling in excitement.

“What is it?” Audrey demands.

“Was talking with Vickie and she thinks-” Nathan takes a long breath as if overwhelmed with the idea himself, “thinks she can erase the fog wall if she can draw the town from high enough she can see the whole thing. Dwight’s getting a guy with a helicopter to take her up in the morning.”

Audrey and Duke stare at Nathan in amazement for a long moment before they both break into a flurry of questions.

“It’s fog, if she erases one piece won’t the rest just flood in to fill it?”

“Will the plane be able to get her high enough to see the whole town?”

“It’s fog, it moves, it won’t be the same four seconds after she finishes the piece.”

“Hasn’t she drawn Haven before?”

Nathan answers them as best he can but nothing they say rocks the grin on his face. He believes it. He believes in this plan.

Duke subsides after the initial round of questioning, going quiet and thoughtful but Audrey is too wrapped up in the possibility of the plan working to stop in the moment. The chopper should be able to get her high enough to see the whole town. When they sent the chopper out before to see if they could fly over the fog it was plenty high enough. Vickie’s drawn Haven before but her Trouble has an off switch now. She can turn it on at will. The biggest challenge is the fog, what if, what if, what if. But they’re no worse off if the plan fails. And if it succeeds…

She kisses Nathan fiercely. The hope bubbling in her chest is echoed in the grip of his fingers on her wrists.

If it succeeds...

They go home and eat dinner, home fries and frozen burger patties that Duke doctors with spices Audrey’s sure Nathan didn’t even know he had in his cabinets. They make do with sliced bread and crack jokes about going to the grocery tomorrow that make Nathan’s eyes light up. Duke keeps up a constant stream of chatter while he cooks and while they eat, a studied casual that she doesn’t fall for any more. She lets him talk himself out, entertaining them with stories of his time in Puerto Vallarta, watches him do his double tap toast with Nathan wearing his best false smile.  

She turns the thought over and over in her mind, trying to figure out why Duke of all people would be disappointed at the idea of the shroud coming down. Their caged bird should have been beating himself bloody against the bars, Audrey knows damn well he hates feeling trapped and that’s exactly what the fog wall is. She’d seen how relieved he was when they got outside it even for the short while they’d waited for the pizzas. But he hasn’t even suggested a trip outside since then.

After dinner, Nathan goes out onto the porch to look up at the roiling clouds just visible between the trees. They’re grey with night, stars barely peeking through. He shivers when the breeze off the water catches him and Audrey smiles, slipping her hand into his.

He looks down in surprise and squeezes her fingers.

He glances over her head and his smile widens. Audrey turns to find Duke standing in the doorway.

Something in Duke’s body language immediately makes her think of the way he’d looked when he first showed up on their doorstep, shoulders braced, hesitant, like a dog who expected yet another blow. She’d missed it under the thin layer of bravado he’d put on; the chin up, flippant “Miss me?” on his lips that had put all her hackles up then had distracted her exactly as he’d intended, then. It doesn’t work now. She wants this awful tension gone, she wants back the Duke who teased her this afternoon. She doesn’t want him braced for the next hit.

“Are you trying to heat the whole neighborhood with the door open like this?” Duke asks, clearly parroting Nathan’s words back at him if the way Nathan rolls his eyes is any indication.

Nathan leaves his post anyway, takes the four steps to kiss Duke right in the doorway, hands on his hips, so their two outlines blur into one, hope and trepidation merging and Audrey realizes Nathan knows something’s up too, reads it in the way he kisses Duke like he’s trying to infuse him with some of his own enthusiasm. Duke kisses back, artful in his distraction as he leads Nathan down the hall towards the bedroom.

Audrey lets him, lets him kiss her in turn, but she can taste the hint of despair that flavors his kiss. They all three tumble into bed and then Audrey flips them, pins Duke with her hands at his wrists, with her knees at his hips. Duke smirks up at her, maybe thinking this is a throwback to their talk of cuffs earlier.

Instead Audrey leans over and murmurs in his ear so he’ll hear her, feel her words.

“We’re not going to decide we don’t want you anymore when the shroud comes down,” she tells him seriously, each word dropping like a bomb. Duke’s whole body jerks under her in surprise. His eyes go wide and he looks to Nathan who gives Duke his best unimpressed face. Who would have thought Audrey would ever want to kiss him for doing that? Tonight, thought, she does.

“Thought we covered this,” Nathan drawls.

Duke opens his mouth and closes it again, consternation flashing across his face. “I--”

“No,” Audrey says simply. She sits back, landing on his thighs so he has room to sit up instead of having this conversation flat on his back. She doesn’t get up though, doesn’t give him the room to get up either.

“Listen,” Duke says, following her up like she thought he would, but he doesn’t push her off, instead he wraps a hand around her hip, anchoring her. Audrey’s going to take that as a good sign even if he follows that with a very uncomfortable, “People-” He waves his hand, searching for the words, “do things, feel things under extreme circumstances-” Or maybe just how to say them.

“Exigent circumstances?” Nathan snorts, and Audrey can see how he’s covering real alarm with the sarcastic, “really gonna argue exigent circumstances to us?”

Duke looks affronted. “It’s a valid concern,” he protests. “I’ve seen it happen on ships from-”

“From here to Timbuktu, yeah, yeah, yeah,” Nathan rolls his eyes.

Duke stiffens in annoyance under her, frustrated that Nathan’s not taking him seriously, but Audrey knows he is.

“Now, when things are all shot to hell, you can do what you want but after, when things get back to normal?” Duke’s voice is a study in barely held frustration, he’s practically vibrating under Audrey’s legs. “How are you going to be police officers who live in a poly relationship?” Duke demands on a hiss. “How are you, Mr. Straight and Narrow, going to deal with the stares and the rumors and the whispers? How about what they’re going to say about Audrey?” Duke points out.

Audrey doesn’t give a rat’s ass what people say about her but she knows it’ll bother Nathan, bother Duke.

“Right now it doesn’t matter,” Duke goes on, earnest brown eyes so full of concern for everyone but himself, “but it will, it will in a town as small and small minded as this, Nathan!”

“Saved the whole damn town too many times to give a damn what they think,” Nathan growls right back.

“You say that now but this can’t work!” Duke insists, looking like he’d like to pace or swing his arms or something, but they’ve got him hemmed in. “We don’t even have a big enough bed for the three of us!”

Audrey startles but even as he says it his hand around her hip tightens, anchoring her in place. He’s not complaining about their current positions. She hasn’t ever thought the bed’s too small. Sure they’re...close. She hasn’t wanted to be further away than-

“Then we’ll buy a new damn bed!” Nathan explodes, ever the practical tactician.

“This isn’t exigent circumstances, Duke,” Audrey cuts into the shouting match, because that’s enough of that. “Or if it is, our whole lives are exigent circumstances!” Audrey exclaims, throwing a hand out to encompass… Haven, everything. “But look me in the eye and tell me you didn’t want this, us, before the Void and Mara and everything else!” Audrey dares, “because I can’t. I can’t.” she repeats. And it’s true. It’s so true. “All those evenings at the Gull, the three of us talking and laughing and drinking, tell me those didn’t feel like home,” her voice cracks on the word, on how much weight those evenings had held, on how she’d carried them with her into the Barn, how they’d brought her back to herself, to the voices shouting for Audrey Parker, to them. “Tell me they didn’t feel like how you wanted every day to end,” she dares, the words sticky with tears.

Duke’s face softens. Nathan lays a hand on each of their shoulders, gives hers a squeeze.

“Didn’t even realize it,” Nathan’s words rumble out of his chest, heavy with wonder and weight. “Couldn’t’ve admitted it to myself then,” he confesses. “Mighta been pushed into admitting it by the circumstances,” Nathan has the good grace to look chagrined. He opens and closes his mouth a few times, searching for the right words. They wait for him. When he speaks he takes Audrey’s breath away. “I want this,” he says clearly looking first to Duke then to Audrey, making sure they’re hearing him, pinning them with that intense blue gaze. “Want the three of us, however it works, whatever we have to do to make it work.”

Audrey’s breath whooshes out at his words. With Nathan as her backup she’s sure they can make this work.

Duke ducks his head, clearly overwhelmed, his hair falling to curtain his expression as he thinks of an answer. When he finally looks up it’s clear his next words are going to be flip or self deprecating or at the very least a kind lie and she can’t bear that. So Audrey puts a finger on his lips.

“You don’t need to believe us tonight,” she says gently, though her heart aches at the conflicting emotions on his face. “I just needed you to hear it, needed you to know.”

His hand on her hip squeezes and then releases. She pushes him backward and he goes without complaint, lying back and looking up at her with solemn eyes in a serious face. Nathan kisses him before she can and she takes the moment to stretch out against Duke’s side, leg curled over his, brushing Nathan’s calf. Duke’s hand shifts from her hip to her shoulder, tucking her in against him. He’s trembling, Audrey realizes, wrapping her arm around his middle, laying her head on his shoulder.

He wants to believe them, even if he doesn’t just yet. And okay fine, maybe the bed is a tight fit, and maybe bringing down the shroud and curing the Troubles isn’t the only hurdle they’re going to face. If they can do all that they can make this work, damnit.

Nathan’s hand lands on her hip, linking them all together, long, sure fingers holding on in the dim light of the lone lamp.

“Tell me where you’ll take us when the fog wall comes down,” Audrey asks. “Somewhere close we can go for a weekend til everything settles,” she suggests.

Duke laughs and if she didn’t know better she’d think it was a real one. “What happened to all work and no play making somebody a responsible adult?” he teases, but his voice comes out husky and heavy.

“Someone else promised to make it worth my while to take a break from the work,” she teases back.

Duke huffs a laugh. “I seem to remember that being the other way around,” he complains, but his hand stroking up and down her arm is steadier now.

“Could take Parker to see the Paul Bunyan statue in Bangor. She hasn’t seen it yet,” Nathan suggests, voice so dry it takes Audrey a minute to realize he’s joking.

Duke groans and thunks his head back against the mattress.  “This is why you’re not allowed to plan any vacations,” he declares.

“Been a while since I went to the model train museum in Jonesport,” Nathan continues, though a smile is starting to steal across his face, ruining the very serious suggestions he’s making.

“We are not going to the model train museum! What are you, twelve?” Duke demands.

“Well where do you want to go?” Nathan huffs, as if he’s fed up with Duke shooting down his ideas when really, his grin has stolen across his face and is crinkling his eyes.

Audrey can’t help it, she laughs at her boys even as Duke makes a show of digging his shoulders into the mattress, visibly settling in though he keeps grumbling. He traces his hand up Audrey’s arm and back down again so his fingers graze over Nathan’s still wrapped around her hip.

“This is where we’re going,” he tells them, and he takes them there with his words, spinning visions of a cozy resort with private hot tubs and fireplaces, champagne and room service.

It’s a nice fantasy.

Audrey holds onto it as she falls asleep. It makes the weight of the shroud easier to bear.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Got a fav line? fav part? I'd love to hear about it :)


	5. Erasing

They all turn out to the docks, Audrey and Nathan and Duke, Dwight, Gloria, Vince. They haven’t told anyone else, it’s too dangerous to get anyone else’s hopes up. It’s cold this morning, but not an unnatural cold, just a Maine winter cold.

“Kinda cold that’ll put hair on your chest,” Gloria jokes with Audrey. It’s a joke she might have made with Duke, before, but not Audrey, and Audrey realizes Gloria’s now claimed her as one of her own. She grins, amazed and touched.

The motor on the seaplane starts up, and all conversation is lost as it roars to life, coasting across the waves of the inlet. Afterward they’re all mostly too tense to speak. Everybody except Vince, of course. Duke walks Nathan off when it seems he’s likely to snap at the man.

“Smells like snow,” Dwight says loudly over Vince, clearly reaching for a safer conversation topic.

Audrey sits on the worn wooden planks of the dock and tilts her head back to study the sky. It hasn’t snowed since the fog wall went up, hasn’t rained either though the sky has threatened to do both more than a few times. She’s tried hard not to think about it as it gives her the uncomfortable sensation of being trapped under a glass bowl. She didn’t enjoy Hadley’s snow globe Trouble either.

Vince and Gloria bicker about the likelihood of snow - Audrey gets the impression Gloria’s humoring Vince - and Audrey turns her gaze to the toy figure of the sea plane gliding out over the water. Vickie’s up there now, sketching the swirling, twisting arms of fog that surround the town. If it doesn’t work, how long until they run out of water? Without rain how will they grow crops regardless of how many green thumb Troubles they turn up? Could they build a water filtration plant somehow and use seawater? This is all way above Audrey’s pay grade.

She glances down the docks; Nathan and Duke have turned and started back their way. Their hands are in their coat pockets against the chill but their shoulders bump on every other step, they’re so close. Nathan’s gaze is squinted against the breeze the same as Duke’s and that makes her smile. At least there’s that. Nathan can feel again. He bumps his shoulder into Duke’s on purpose, jostling the other man off course, and they laugh as Duke bumps him back. They have Duke.

She’s had so many miracles, even if they never bring the shroud down.

But there are so many other people here, trapped. They’ve got family and loved ones out there, who don’t even remember them. Vickie’s dad is off on some boat out at sea and he’s forgotten all about her. There are kids here who’ve never left Haven for more than a day or two, who’ve never left Maine, kids like Nathan was who need to get out from under their parents’ thumbs even if it’s just long enough to go to college, kids like Duke was who need to go out and find their place in the world before they can come back. And there are kids who need to get out of here and never come back, kids who will go out and find a new town and make a new family. If they cure their Troubles, they can do that. They _can_ leave and never come back even without the barn and the cycle, even better than with the barn and the cycle. They _can_ leave and see the world - the Eiffel tower and Caribbean beaches, Vegas, Italy, Egypt, all the places Audrey’s never been.

But not if they don’t bring down the shroud.

Audrey eyes the plane.

It looks larger.

It’s coming back.

She scrambles to her feet, glances at her watch- has it really been almost an hour?

She can just make out the noise of the engine. Nathan and Duke must too because they come to stand beside her. Nathan clasps Duke’s shoulder, silent support. The others step forward, everyone on alert as the drone of the engine grows louder and louder.

They land with hardly a splash, coasting up to the dock. Dwight and Duke are there tying it off while the rest of them wait with bated breath for the cockpit door to open. Vickie comes out first, hair ruffled, hands shaking. Nathan catches her when she trips coming down the steps.

“Thanks,” she tells him, getting her feet solidly under her on the dock. “That’s definitely not on my list of things to do again,” she jokes.

Gloria pats her shoulder in sympathy. “Can’t understand why anyone would want to throw themselves through the air in a tin can barely bigger than my refrigerator.”

Vickie shudders and nods.

Apparently this is more than Vince can take.

“Well,” he exclaims, “did you draw it?”

“Yes,” Vickie breathes out, holding up her sketchbook.

“Let’s see it,” he demands.

They all take a few steps down the dock so the pilot can disembark.

“Thanks, Janet,” Dwight tells the woman, who nods silently.

Vickie flips open the sketchbook and there it is in grey and white. The fog wall forms a ring around the whole peninsula, even across the water. Vickie’s drawn the land, dotted it with houses- the docks, the forests, the lakes, the roads, it’s all there from a bird’s eye point of view.

“Well,” Vince prompts again. “Get on with it, girl,” he orders.

“Here? Now?” Vickie squeaks. “I didn’t think you-”

Audrey takes one of Vickie’s hands and smiles at her. “Here. Now. You’ve got this,” she says, though inside she’s trembling as hard as the girl is. _What if it doesn’t work? What if it doesn’t work?_

Vickie kneels right there on the dock and fishes an eraser out of her pocket. Audrey kneels with her. Vickie glances at Audrey, at Gloria; they give her encouraging nods while Audrey ignores that she can feel her heartbeat in her throat and in her knees where they’re pressed to the boards.

_What if it doesn’t work?_

_What if it doesn’t work?_

Vickie fumbles the eraser, almost drops it. She takes a deep breath and closes her fingers around it firmly and begins to erase.

Nothing happens at first, nothing they can see. Audrey’s gaze flicks between the paper and the fog wall behind them and it looks just the same as it’s always done. And then, further on down the bay it...it looks like it’s starting to thin?

Audrey surges to her feet.

“Look,” she can barely keep her arm steady enough to point as the spot Vickie’s erasing becomes clearer and clearer, the vaguely triangular dark shapes of trees turns into individual branches before the fog rolls in again.

“Keep it up,” Gloria croaks, “keep going.”

Vickie does, she erases, harder and faster than before. Audrey worries she’ll tear the paper for a second but then the fog thins again and she worries she’s not going fast enough.

“Faster,” Vince demands.

Vickie glares up at him but keeps moving, keeps erasing, swath after swath. It’s as if the fog’s encased somehow, like a tunnel maybe, it spreads in its boundaries to fill in the places that have been erased but it’s definitely thinner than it was before.

Vickie blows the eraser bits off the paper- she doesn’t dare smudge this drawing- and keeps going.

The fog thins again, growing weaker and weaker as she erases all the way around Haven under their watchful gazes. Nathan’s hand squeezes Audrey’s shoulder and she reaches up to squeeze back. She glances up at Duke and he looks transfixed, gaze focused on Vickie’s hands. Minutes pass in tense silence as Vickie erases all the way around. The wall is paper thin now, more haze than fog; you could count the needles on a few of the closer trees. Vickie glances up at them brows raised, hope blazing out of her face.

Audrey nods. _Do it_.

Vickie erases the final stretch and without even a pop the fog wall, the horrible shroud that’s kept them trapped for so many awful days, vanishes. The wind rushes through as if it had been waiting on the other side, blowing hair and leaves and everything else in its path, sending it all scuttling across the docks, roaring in their ears and sweeping across their faces cold and crisp and clean.

Audrey sucks in a deep, deep breath, filling her lungs with the scent of the outside world.

It smells sweet.

It smells like freedom.

She feels light, lighter than she’s ever felt before, like the breeze could just waft her along. Vince probably says something, Gloria definitely says something, but Audrey only has eyes for Nathan and Duke who are grinning, ear to ear, and laughing, light and free like she’s never heard them.

They did it.

They won.

The first snowflake drifts past her gaze and Audrey smiles, so wide it hurts her cheeks but she can’t stop.

They did it.


	6. Epilogue - A Brave New World (Because screw that finale!)

It snows for five days after the shroud comes down. Only the hardiest of Havenites actually manage to leave. The snow piles up five, almost six feet high in places, with drifts even higher. When the Nor’easter finally blows itself out, the mayor calls FEMA and has a reasonably good excuse as to why the town needs all the help it does. Chris Brody flies in to get the cure and when he does Audrey browbeats him into dealing with the FEMA reps. It all goes a lot smoother after that.

The Haven Chris comes back to is a different Haven than the town he left. The residents are a little kinder, a little wiser. The bigotry seeps back in slowly and in pieces. It was always going to. It never really left. But people hold their heads higher now, walk with dignity and grace. A lot of the shame has been left behind. Control will do that for a person. The whispers don’t get as loud any more; power, after all, demands respect.

People leave. People come back. Some rebuild and some start afresh. Haven PD opens its doors once more, fully staffed, with Nathan Wuornos resuming his post as Chief of Police. Audrey Parker is put in charge of a special task force- one  designed to protect, and police, the Troubled. Power, after all, breeds greed as well. The Grey Gull gets its own second chance. Audrey and Nathan recruit volunteers to salvage and repair what they can. Many of the volunteers are Troubled folk Duke cured. People still talk about the pizza party he threw when the shroud was up. 

And almost exactly two years from the day the shroud came down, Audrey, Nathan, and Duke leave on a trip to see the world they saved.

They did it.

They won.

They lived.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And so we come to the end. I'm actually kinda sad to post it. It's a bittersweet feeling. I want to thank all of you who have patiently stuck by this week after week, your kudos and comments and support have been a blessing and have meant so much. I've had some bad days during the posting of this but even during those I could read (or reread, or re-reread, or re-re-rea... you get the picture ;) ) your comments and still manage a smile. So from the bottom of my heart, _thank you._ I've posted in fandoms where the response has been pretty thin and it's felt like screaming into the void and getting nothing back, but you guys have made me excited to post, made me feel like I wasn't shouting to an empty room and that has made so much of a difference. There's still more to come in this 'verse because apparently this is where I live now LOL but the updates will be more sporadic so I recommend you subscribe or come find me on Tumblr (I'm serendipityxxi over there too) if you're interested in the Aftermath which thus far involves lots of dealing with trauma, fluff and a little smut. :)
> 
> And as always if you had a favourite part? paragraph? line? I'd love to hear about it :)


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